Japan will join a French research effort to develop a new nuclear reactor that promoters say will use fuel more efficiently and produce less atomic waste.
Prime Minister Shinzo Abe and French President Francois Hollande agreed to "intensify their civil nuclear research," according to a joint statement issued Monday following a meeting between the two leaders in Paris.
As part of Abe's state visit, the Japanese ministries of economy and science and France's atomic research institute signed an accord to cooperate on a project for a so-called fourth generation fast-breeder reactor called Astrid. Fast-breeder generators are designed to produce, or "breed," more fuel than they consume for reuse in nuclear fission.